The United Kingdom has recently been totally
absorbed with the Jun 23rd referendum on whether the UK should Remain or Exit the
European Union.The arguments in favor
of the Remain camp appear to hinge on its claim that the UK’s economy would
collapse if it terminated its EU membership.UK citizens should not panic, however, but instead take a closer look at
the “Israeli model”.

The modern State of Israel has been an “adopted”
member of many European entities for some time - mainly due to the
unwillingness of surrounding Arab countries in Asia and Africa to accept the
Jewish State into “their” continents.Israel is not a member of the EU, but the current relationship has many
mutual benefits.Using news articles
since the beginning of this year, here are some examples of how the
relationship benefits both Israel and Europe.

Trade / Economy / Business

Israel has just joined the European
Organization for the Safety of Air Navigation (Eurocontrol).Eurocontrol provides advanced control and
navigation aviation services for managing and planning air traffic flows over
European airspace to reduce delays in flight times. In another important European transport
project - Fresh Food Corridors (FFC), Israel organized the first ever “reefer”
(temperature-controlled containers) block
train loaded with Israeli
fruit and veg from the Slovenian port of Koper to Rotterdam. It arrived
6 days earlier than ships that currently sail non-stop from Israel to
Rotterdam.And Israel is to connect
its power grid to continental Europe via a 1,518 km subsea power cable,
known as the EuroAsia
InterConnector. It will allow Israel to sell its excess electricity
generated from natural gas to anywhere in mainland Europe.

Israel’s hi-tech startups are extremely
successful in Europe. Eco Wave Power has just completed the installation in
Gibraltar of Europe’s first grid-connected wave-energy
system.Stratoscale has won a Red
Herring Europe 2016 award for its solution that can get you up and
running using Cloud services in a few minutes, whatever computer hardware your
company currently uses.Israel’s Pashut
Yarok is exporting “shockpads” - plastic foam
safety surfaces for children’s playgrounds - to countries in the
European Union. Meanwhile, Israel’s Amiad has opened its first UK office, in
Swansea - home of Welsh Water, to support increasing demand
in the UK and Europe.

Israeli startups frequently win European
competition prizes.Israel’s Capitalise won one of five Best in Show
awards at London’s FinovateEurope
2016.The Capitali.se
platform uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to read the text of an
investor’s investment strategy and convert it into executable market trading
instructions.Staying with in financial
arena, European investors are so keen to invest in Israeli companies that International
finance giant BlackRock launched an exchange-traded-fund
(ETF) that allows them to invest
directly in Israel’s top 25 listed companies.

Medical

Europe’s health owes much to Israel’s
unique relationship with the continent.Hardly
a week goes by without an Israeli treatment or medical device receiving CE
approval.The latest include LifeSeal,
the no-leak sealant solution for patients who have undergone gastrointestinal
(GI) surgery.Another is the neuroAD
transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and cognitive training from Israel’s Neuronix that is used to
treat Alzheimer’s sufferers.

Sometimes Israel’s proximity to Europe
makes medical approval easy – which is why Australian, Canadian and US kids
travel to Europe (and Israel) for the ApiFix
non-fusion treatment of their Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis (twisted
spine).

Israel has just become the first country
outside Europe’s geographic borders to be accepted as a full member of the
European Federation of Crohn’s
and Ulcerative Colitis Associations (EFCCA).

Science

Israeli technical expertise really is out
of this world.Israel’s Windward
tracks vessels entering Europe and identifies any that broadcast a fake
identity.Israel has been involved with
the European Space Agency’s ExoMars mission, from day one. Israel’s Rafael Industries made the vital hydrazine
thrusters for the Schiaparelli landing module, which on 19th Oct will slow
the decent of Schiaparelli to just 2 meters above the Mars
surface.

Hagihon - Jerusalem’s water company - has
been awarded a key role on the 4-year EU project to improve governance and social
awareness of water environmental challenges.It involves setting up a Digital
Social Platform to share details of water scarcity, security, quality
and water consumption-related issues.Israeli startups receive dozens of grants from the EU’s Horizon 2020
program.One such is Electroad, developer of Dynamic Wireless
Power Transfer (DWPT) that will charge
electric buses from the road they are being driven on.No need for a battery or charging spots.

Sport

Tiny Israel often makes a big splash at
European sports events.Gal
Nevo took home the silver medal in the 200-meter individual medley at
the European Swimming Championships in London.Alex
Shatilov claimed his sixth career medal (a bronze) at the European
Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Bern, Switzerland.Ron
Atias (ranked 80 in the world) won the taekwondo under-58 kg silver
medal at the European Championships in Montreux, Switzerland.Or
Sasson and Timna
Nelson-Levy won silver and bronze respectively at the European Judo Championships.But the biggest recent successes were gold,
silver and bronze medals for Israel’s rhythmic
gymnastics team at the European Championships in Israel.

Finally, 8,000 Jews from France
decided on their own EU-Exit last year as Aliya from Western Europe
hit record levels.UK
Aliya was also up by 25%.But as
Superstar Elton
John told 40,000 ecstatic fans at Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park, there could
have been no nicer place for him to open his eight-week European tour.

In the Synagogue this week we read the
“Song of the Sea” and how the prophetess Miriam (Moses’s sister) led the women
in song and dance to celebrate the Hebrews’ escape from Pharaoh’s army.Miriam is attributed with reuniting Moses’
parents and providing a miraculous well of water that travelled with the
Hebrews in the wilderness.Today,
Israel’s women are at the forefront of Israel’s phenomenal innovations and
achievements, as evidenced in these examples from the past few weeks.

I’ll begin where I left off in my last
blog, in which I contrasted the Biblical splitting of the Sea of Reeds to
Israel Technion Professor Lilac Amirav’s
splitting of water
into hydrogen and oxygen with 100% efficiency using nanotechnology and
solar energy.Another female Professor, Anat
Lowenstein from Tel Aviv University, was selected by Ophthalmologist
Magazine in the top 100 most influential people in the world of ophthalmology.
It noted that “her contribution to, and influence in the field of medical and
surgical retina cannot be underestimated.”Women certainly lead the way atSoroka
Medical Center in Beer Sheva, where they are in charge of the
departments for Infectious Diseases, Women’s Ultrasound, At Risk Mother &
Child unit, Respiratory clinic, Interventional neurology, Ophthalmology, Child and
Adolescent Psychiatric unit, Geriatric medicine, Neonatology, Pathology and
more.

Staying in the medical arena, Dana
Chanan is the CEO and cofounder of Israel’s Sweetch which has developed an app to detect
pre-diabetes and provide diabetics with the tools to prevent the disease
developing.Meanwhile, heading up the
non-profit Pears Program for Global Innovation is Israel’s Dr. Aliza
Belman-Inbal whose Grand Challenge Israel has just awarded a
500,000-shekel prize to Israeli startup BioFeed for developing its solutionfor
eradicating the Zika
virus.

Israeli women are taking “tikun olam”
(repairing the world) to new levels.As Elana
Kaminka, Deputy Director of Israel’s Tevel b’Tzedek highlights, contrary
to the lies of the BDS supporters, Israel doesn’t just show up at disaster
areas and leave.They are still working
in Nepal – a year after the two earthquakes that killed 9,000. And Sivan
Ya’ari is the founder of Innovation: Africa, which has brought clean
water and renewable electricity to one million people in 104 rural villages in Malawi,
Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa, Senegal, Tanzania, DRC and Ethiopia.

Here in the Jewish State, most of the
leaders of Israel’s social programs are women.One major international program – Good Deeds
Day – was initiated in 2007 by Israeli businesswoman and
philanthropist, Shari Arison.This
year’s event has been adopted by 70 nations and involved millions of
volunteers.Without mentioning any other
names, take a look at organizations such as Ezer Mizion,
whose volunteers help cancer sufferers and their over-stretched families. Or Sobar,
which is establishing a no-alcohol
music bar to provide a safe place for Jerusalem youth.Or the Red Mountain
Therapeutic Riding School, in Israel’s Arava desert, which provides riding therapy for 200
special needs children and adults each week.

Before you shout, “But what about Israeli-Arab
women?” please read about Faiza,
an Israeli-Arab doctor who works in the intensive care unit at a major Israeli
private hospital.She has ten siblings -
most of them graduates of Israeli universities.Or about the young Muslim
and Christian women joining the Israel Defense Forces. Israel certainly opened the eyes of Dr.
Carol Jahshan, the daughter of a Lebanese refugee from Haifa who grew
up in Beirut before moving the USA.She has
just completed a 3-month working collaboration at Israel’s Bar Ilan University.And Jamila Hair,
the 76-year-old female Druze owner of an Israeli soap factory, amazed the audience
and media at the Festival of Women in Segovia, Spain, when she spoke about the
peace between her Jewish, Muslim, Christian, and Druze women workers. Interestingly, the Druze revere Jethro (father-in-law
to Moses) who joined up with the Hebrews when he heard about their Exodus from
Egypt.

Twelve Israeli women featured in Timeout’s article to
mark International Women’s Day.They
work in TV, women’s collectives, alternative medicine, art, fashion, community,
advertising, dance, incubators, Africa, ceramics and aviation.The future is also bright, with girls at
Israel’s state schools having excellent opportunities to achieve success.One such girl is 10th grade student Tamar
Barbi from Hod Hasharon who just discovered a new "Three Radii
Theorem" whilst studying mathematics at the highest level in Israel.

Finally, however, perhaps (as King Solomon
wrote) there really is nothing new under the Sun.Because just a few weeks ago a rare
2500-year-old seal, inscribed with the name of Elihana bat Gael
in ancient Hebrew letters, was unearthed at the City of David in the Jerusalem
Walls National Park.The seal, found in
a building from the First Temple period, showed that the owner was probably a
successful businesswoman.And maybe even
a good prophet!